Praewoodsia (Paperback)

High Quality Content by WIKIPEDIA articles! Praewoodsia is an extinct genus of prehistoric bony fish that lived during the early Oligocene epoch. Osteichthyes (pronounced / sti k i.i z/), also called bony fish, are a taxonomic group of fish that have bony, as opposed to cartiligeous, skeletons. The vast majority of fish are osteichthyes, which is an extremely diverse and abundant group consisting of over 29,000 species. It is the largest class of vertebrates in existence today. Osteichthyes is divided into the ray-finned fish (Actinopterygii) and lobe-finned fish (Sarcopterygii). In most classification systems the Osteichthyes are paraphyletic with land vertebrates. That means that the nearest common ancestor of all Osteichthyes includes tetrapods amongst its descendants. Actinopterygii (ray-finned fish) are monophyletic, but the inclusion of Sarcopterygii in Osteichthyes causes Osteichthyes to be paraphyletic.